Please note that the laws conveyed are the views of the authorities cited in each post, but other authorities may disagree. Please check with your halachic authority.

All points of view are welcome in this forum, if expressed civilly. For personal manifestos, please start your own blog.

Sunday, August 24, 2014

The blessing to recite for medicine

Hi,

One who enters to let blood says, "May it be Your
will, Gd, my Master, that this be a cure for me, for You heal at no cost."
After he lets blood, he should say, "Blessed is the Healer of the
sick."

(Shulchan Aruch Orach Chaim 230:4)

And so in every healing endeavour he should say this,
and not think that any particular entity will heal him, only the Creator. Via
this prayer he will place his trust in Gd, and ask that this should heal him.

(Mishneh Berurah 230:6)

Therefore, when one takes medication as well - even
many times in a day – and for every medical action (i.e. putting in eye drops,
smearing on a paste, or giving an injection), or for every surgical action,
however minor, we must turn to Gd with this prayer, for Gd, and only Gd, is the
true healer. Also before any exercise of any kind that one performs at the
instruction of a doctor because of his illness, one must turn to Gd with this
prayer. Even for something which seems to be minor, such as when a mother
places a bandage on a child's small cut, she should be careful to recite with
him this y'hi ratzon, for a cut can develop infection despite the bandage
and [yet] some heal without anything at all – it is all in the hands of Heaven.
And my mentor Rabbi Neuvirth said to me, "This is obvious." Further,
with this she will take the opportunity to teach her child that it is not the
bandage that heals, but it is Gd, and there is no other.